The glyceollins (GLYs) are natural product compounds that display properties indicative for use as cancer prevention and treatment agents. To date, supplies of the GLYs must be obtained by their induced biosynthesis in soybean plant parts followed by tedious extraction and purification procedures which provide extremely low yields. Thus, there is an immediate need for improved methods to produce various GLY compounds for further development, as well as a longer-term need for producing large supplies of selected GLY members for eventual use within the marketplace.
The WO2009/111428A2 generally describes a method for synthesizing GLYs I and II that can be used to prepare a variety of GLY-related compounds, including glycinol and certain synthetic intermediates that have-novel compositions of matter. The purified, individual GLY members, synthetic intermediates and selected analogs display useful pharmacological properties similar to the naturally-derived materials.
There is still a need, however, for new methods for the production of variously substituted isoflavene natural product analogs.